Between Worlds
by Kara Crane
Summary: Just after 'Along Came a Spider'. After returning to base, Prowl has an extraordinary experience. Or did he? Songfic. Oneshot.


Disclaimer: Transformers is not mine, the song 'All Souls Night' is not mine.

AN: I got pulled into the music, and this started running through my head. See my profile for a link to the song on Youtube.

The very air was thrumming, rousing Prowl from his recharge cycle. Visor narrowing, he opened his mouth to yell at Bumblebee and Sari to turn down the stereo. But there was no sound of humans howling out lyrics or the screeching of electric guitars that usually accompanied such a beat. Silence hung heavily in the air, yet his armour continued to vibrate. Then he realised it wasn't just the warehouse, it was the entire city. Wary, he leapt to the top of the canopy to look at the city for any obvious sign of trouble.

_Bonfires dot the rolling hillsides._

_Figures dance around and around_

_to drums that pulse out echoes of darkness;_

_moving to the pagan sound._

Among the strangely dark and silent buildings were thousands ... no, millions of light blue flames. They flitted about like fireflies, along the ground and in the sky. Groups seemed to congregate around smaller red flames that hovered at the base of buildings, on the steps and in the glass-less windows. Prowl, for all his training, felt compelled to join them.

_Somewhere in a hidden memory_

_images float before my eyes_

_of fragrant nights of straw and of bonfires,_

_dancing till the next sunrise._

Suddenly, he was a youngling again and with his family on Cybertron. He tagged along on the heels of his mech-creator in emulation. He wanted to be just like him, so he copied and memorised every movement. Together they sharpened and polished the bladed weaponry and moved gracefully and silently through katas. His femme-creator was a crack-shot and he was at her side all over again as she taught him to properly handle a fusion rifle, how to hit the head of a small drone half a mile away by compensating for the gravity of the planet when aiming. Then he was back on Earth, watching the little blue flames. Caution was thrown to the wind.

_I can see the lights in the distance_

_trembling in the dark cloak of night._

_Candles and lanterns are dancing, dancing_

_a waltz on all souls night._

The moment he left the tree, he felt free. He thought nothing, all he knew was emotion as he danced over the highway and zipped about. Prowl didn't stay in the dark sky for long before he was drawn like the others to the prancing red flames. Warmth he hadn't realised was missing flowed into him. Once he was filled with warmth he was swept up in a wave of the playful blue fire and carried into the soothing darkness of the star-speckled sky. Time was lost to him.

_Figures of cornstalks bend in the shadows_

_held up tall as the flames leap high._

_The Green Knight holds the holly bush_

_to mark where the old year passes by._

He soared higher and higher, not held to the Earth like the others until he was in the empty vacuum. From his vantage he admired the bright, burning sun that held the part of the world he'd just emerged from in shadows. The lights, red and blue, numbered in the billions on the land masses. The areas of water were disturbingly empty and were eerily dark ...He was suddenly lonely, and wanted the warmth of the flickering red lights to fill him again. Prowl turned, gazing at the cold, peaceful, space around him before diving effortlessly to the surface of the planet.

_I can see the lights in the distance_

_trembling in the dark cloak of night._

_Candles and lanterns are dancing, dancing_

_a waltz on all souls night._

_Bonfires dot the rolling hillsides._

_Figures dance around and around_

_to drums that pulse out echoes of darkness;_

_moving to the pagan sound._

The thrumming filled him again, like the purr of a well tuned engine or an earth feline and he shivered in delight at the sensation as it crawled along his core. Without warning, an orange glow bathed everything, he turned toward the lake and felt only a tug on his Spark as he gazed at the bonfire that was many kilometers wide and high. It sat peacefully on the water and drew the smaller blue flames to it. A pulse replaced the comforting thrumming vibration, it felt ... alien. Curious, he floated toward it

.

_Standing on the bridge that crosses_

_the river that goes out to the sea._

_The wind is full of a thousand voices;_

_they pass by the bridge and me._

_I can see the lights in the distance_

_trembling in the dark cloak of night._

_Candles and lanterns are dancing, dancing_

_a waltz on all souls night._

Something like a barrier stopped him at the edge of the pier, a barrier all but he could cross. The silence that had filled the air was gone, replaced by muted voices. No matter how hard he listened he couldn't hear what they were saying. Some of the blue flames, as if finally acknowledging he was there, slowed in their dash to the bright bonfire on the water and danced around him, brushing up against him and filling him with a sense of being found. As though he'd been lost the entire time. He wanted to go home. The orange glow flickered on a string that he hadn't seen before. It was tied to his core and led away from the lake. He followed it. It took him to the warehouse, to the tree. A light from above, the moon, caressed a dark shape in the branches. An intruder? Why was it in his tree? The string gave a sharp tug, pulling him to the inert form of ... him?

_I can see the lights in the distance_

_trembling in the dark cloak of night._

_Candles and lanterns are dancing, dancing_

_a waltz on all souls night._

His senses were being assaulted. Blasting horns filled his audio receptors, smog and other noxious pollutants threatened to overload his olfactory sensors. He sat upright sharply and turned his optics online, scanning the area. Nothing. There was no giant bonfire on the lake, no little blue lights floating around, the city was filled light and life and sound, like the night before last had been.

Prowl checked his internal chronometer, it was 7:46 am, November 1st, last night had been what Sari called 'Halloween'.


End file.
